When autumn arrives in Transylvania, the air grows sharp and metallic, and the forests shed their color until only the stone of the mountains seems alive. Smoke rises from the first hearth fires, curling above tiled roofs and lingering with its sweet scent in the cold. In the West, this is the season of Halloween I am familiar with - a celebration of ghosts, costumes, and death. In Romania, the same chill carries something older. There are no pumpkin lanterns or suburban tric

Before the word “vampire” ever reached Western Europe and long before Bram Stoker turned Transylvania into a gothic legend, Romanians were already telling stories about the strigoi — spirits that slipped between the worlds of the living and the dead. These were not imagined monsters from distant castles but familiar faces: neighbors, relatives, and townspeople whose souls could not find rest. In traditional belief, a strigoi was not born from evil so much as imbalance. It was

Walk through any Transylvanian town and you’ll find echoes of another world such as fortified churches, cobbled squares, pastel guild houses, Latin inscriptions, and names like Kronstadt, Hermannstadt, and Schäßburg. These are traces of the Transylvanian Saxons, the German settlers who came nearly nine centuries ago and shaped the cultural heart of the region. Arrival of the Saxons The story begins in the 12th century, when the Hungarian kings invited German colonists to sett

Keeper of the damp earth, you rise from mud and moonlight, skin glistening like the memory of rain, eyes heavy with ancient knowing. You are not only lowly, but a vessel: the one who carries transformation in your dewey flesh. Your body bears the mark of both realms, water and soil, birth and decay, reminding us that life itself is a cycle of dissolving and return. Once, they feared your touch, said you carried curses in your skin, poison in your breath, that witches hid your

In Transylvania, as November dies and winter gathers on the hills, there comes a night when the old beliefs stir again. Between November 29 and 30, the feast of Saint Andrew, the veil between worlds is said to thin. It is a time when wolves speak, spirits wander, and villagers once guarded their homes with garlic and prayer. Known as Noaptea Sfântului Andrei, this night marks one of Romania’s most mysterious folk observances, a blend of Christian feast and pre-Christian ritua

Cat, watcher in the half-light, you move like a shadow that chose its own shape, fur humming with the memory of danger, eyes catching...

Perched on a rocky outcrop at the edge of the Carpathians, Bran Castle looks as though it was built for legend. Its towers and courtyards...

Bear, keeper of the deep earth, you move with the weight of mountains, fur thick with the silence of forests, claws carved from the roots...

Every city carries its stories, but in Brașov, legends feel as present as the cobblestones beneath your feet. Nestled in the Carpathians,...

There’s something about Transylvania that you can’t quite capture in a photograph or even in words. The mountains stand heavy with...